


Fragments of a Dream

by sareliz



Category: My Dear Cold-Blooded King
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dreams, F/M, Is anyone else vacillating from one theory to another hourly?, It's all a dream, Mei POV, Steamy, Who has picked her?, Who will she pick?, inbetween scenes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-17
Updated: 2017-08-28
Packaged: 2018-12-16 13:35:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11829813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sareliz/pseuds/sareliz
Summary: Kihara Mei is going with the flow and working hard to live an open and honest life in the midst of palace intrigue, decoys, assassination attempts, and annoying men. Her dreams, however, are not quite under the iron control of her sense of duty and honor.Her dreams are something else, entirely.(And if you haven't read the webcomic 'My Dear Cold-Blooded King' by LifeLight, run, don't walk, to that google search and go catch up. Seriously. Sharpish.)





	1. Apprentice To The Court Physician

**Author's Note:**

  * For [linusmir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/linusmir/gifts).



> It seems that while there is boatloads of fanart for this lovely and beautiful comic, there is yet no fanfiction. Well, my skills at drawing are best left private, but my skills at writing have been more finely honed.
> 
> And hell, I've never been the first one on a fanfiction bandwagon. Huh. 
> 
> ::echoes::
> 
> Hellooooo....
> 
> Somebody come and join me so I have something else to read....

Duty and honor required her to be chaste and Kihara Mei felt no sadness in that regard. Perhaps, if she had remained a humble merchant in due time there would have been a good alliance to be made between her family and another, but she had been too valuable to trade for a such a slight dowry, and with her little brother not yet of age, there was no certainty he would remain with the family, or perhaps join a persuasive recruiter for the Blood King’s Army. She was needed to make extra sales of fruit and vegetables in the city center.

Except of course all that had changed.

In the early predawn hours when Mei always woke - too early to get up, too late to return to proper sleep - sometimes she forgets where she is, when she is, _what_ she is.

Duty and honor still require her to be chaste, however many palace intrigues she feels tugging this way and that at her hair. Her position is important - more important than anything she could have imagined would be her fate.

_Apprentice to the Court Physician._

Perhaps in ten or twenty years when the beguiling bloom of youth and beauty Mei grudgingly wore in this place of masks and lies fell from her shoulders, perhaps when she was no longer the apprentice but the master, when a husband could not possibly wish for children from her, nor wish her to be a traditional wife to demurely keep her eyes on the ground while being entirely decorative in character, perhaps then she might find some member of palace staff - not too high, nor too low, no one with aspirations or ambition, just a good, kind man, and certainly no one who willingly involves themselves in bloodshed - and then she might marry.

And then she might no longer need to be chaste.

Until that time, she willed away her blushing cheeks and in an attempt to banish only the latest of a string of nightly dreams, she got up, bent on the task that she had been putting off.

* * *

Her morning ablutions finished, the outfit of the day properly tied in place, Mei knew that she would be utterly alone in the office. Mr. Fujioka did not rise until the sun did - often slightly after - and as there had been no disturbance in the night, injuries would likely not manifest until after morning training did.

The lantern cast its glow over the paper as she considered her words very carefully. In case the letter should be read by anyone - from Mr. Fujioka, to her father, to even the king - Mei wanted her words to be understood clearly.

 

* * *

> _To the one who admires me secretly,_
> 
> _I thank you for the kindness of your words. I am naturally quite flattered by your attention. Whatever your station in life, I am honored that one who is, no doubt, kind and compassionate has taken the time to lay his heart before me._
> 
> _It is with much regret that I must assure you most positively of the firmness of my resolve not to marry at this time, nor to engage in any affair of the heart during my apprenticeship to the Court Physician._
> 
> _I am, as you undoubtedly know, but a humble peasant, and our wise king has given me an opportunity unparalleled. I would not make him regret his decision, nor even consider for an instant that the faith he placed in me is somehow misplaced._
> 
> _I know you would not wish me to fail in my duty and dishonor myself and my family, and thus, in some small way, bring dishonor to the court of our noble king._
> 
> _Though I cannot imagine the pain it will cause you, I must humbly beg you to cease communication and look elsewhere in hope. My own hope is that in an all too brief time, your affection for me, like the cherry blossoms, will whither and fall, only to bloom again for the benefit of some other, better candidate of your attention._
> 
> _May you find her more quickly than you imagine,_
> 
> _Kihara Mei_

* * *

Once the ink had dried, Mei carefully folded it up and placed it in an inner pocket. Over the course of the next few days she would keep her eye out for that first messenger.

It was only hours later that same day that Mei placed her newly penned letter instead, with the latest message from the unnamed admirer, the one informing her that she was already betrothed.

‘Perhaps I can reuse some of the wording in the next draft,’ she considered to herself, as the maids prepared her for her meeting with the king.

* * *

Mei had begun to sleep very well indeed at the palace, if only one didn’t count the dreams. They were haunted by a man - or several men, perhaps - with eyes that seemed to glisten and glow, so intense was his, or perhaps their, demeanor, even while seemingly at rest.

Despite their very different appearance, sometimes the man was Yuuta, and other times he was the Lieutenant. Sometimes he wore the mask of the king, sometimes he did not. Sometimes his face was bloodied, sometimes it was not.

Always he was making passionate love to her.

Oh, Mei was chaste, but that didn’t mean she had no idea what went on between lovers. And she was all-too-aware of what each man looked like, smelled like, felt like up close. Both seemed to be propositioning her at least once a week, and now she was in a sham engagement in which her rebellious loins who thought their thoughts well outside of Mei’s well-defined boundaries of duty and honor, were sending signals of which Mei absolutely did not approve.  Which mean that now Yuuta _knew_ she was attracted to him… and life just became infinitely more complicated.

At least it wasn’t real.

_Would it have been real, if you’d taken him up on the dinner invitation?_

‘It wasn’t just an invitation to _dinner!_ ’ she pointed out vigorously to the voice in her head that lived to contradict her.

_And perhaps then Ryu would stop chasing after you like a dog in heat._

‘The Lieutenant’s impertinence knows no bounds. I doubt anything would make him stop altogether.’

_Sleeping with him, might. Men like that, they want the chase. Once you’re caught, he’ll wander off._

‘Absolutely not! Especially not now that I’m engaged to the king.’

_But he doesn’t really mean it. And after all, Ryu is one of his generals. If you were discreet, he would understand._

‘But I don’t want _Ryu_!’

Mei sighed frustration. She always lost arguments with herself.

Following her breathing in and out, in and out, she tried to focus on the movement of air, and not the inner voice taunting her.

_You were beginning to truly like Yuuta. You craved his company. You declined dinner because you didn’t want to be just another woman in his bed. You wanted to have something special and lovely with him, even though you were ready to deny yourself of it everywhere else. But you would have given it to him, in time, if only ‘the bloodiest commander in the army’ had a modicum of patience. But he’s the king, so of course he doesn’t have patience. He calls. You come. And so it will be, regardless of how this engagement ends._

_Who else but the Blood King himself could possibly be ‘the bloodiest commander in the army’?_

_Who else could a man like Yuuta truly be?_

Mei followed her breathing, and pretended that she was completely unmoved by her imagination, which called up his beautiful voice, how it could caress her face.

When someone called out jovially for Mr. Fujioka from the office, her mind was ripped away from the feel of Yuuta’s tongue trailing back up her neck, soothing the path his teeth had made.

‘What the--?’

Mei lighted the lantern and went out to see what might be needed on a stormy night such as this.

 

* * *

> _To the one who admires me secretly,_
> 
> _I thank you for the kindness of your words. I am naturally quite flattered by your attention. Whatever your station in life, I am honored that one who is, no doubt, kind and compassionate has taken the time to lay his heart before me._
> 
> _I am, as you undoubtedly know, but a humble peasant, and our great king has given me an opportunity unparalleled. I speak both of my apprenticeship to the Court Physician, and of course as his choice of future wife. I would not have His Majesty regret His decision, nor even consider for an instant that the faith He placed in me is somehow misplaced._
> 
> _I know you would not wish me to fail in my duty and dishonor myself and my family, and thus, in some small way, bring dishonor to the court of our noble king._
> 
> _Though I cannot imagine the pain it will cause you, I must humbly beg you to cease communication and look elsewhere in hope. My own hope is that in an all too brief time, your affection for me, like the cherry blossoms, will whither and fall, only to bloom again for the benefit of some other, better candidate of your attention._
> 
> _May you find her more quickly than you imagine,_
> 
> _Kihara Mei_

* * *

“Katsu! _Katsu!”_

Mei hovered between dreaming and wakefulness, and cried out only in her mind.

His hips ground on hers and his silvery hair curtained their faces. Her legs wrapped around him and held him tightly to her while her hands explored the vast network of hard muscles and jagged scars that were so very prevalent between his waist and his neck.

He looked into her eyes and she found the same unfathomable intensity she often saw there. And unlike those other moments, in the dream she knew, she just _knew_ that the intensity was all for her.

“You are like no other woman, Mei. Bold, courageous, and so very profoundly innocent. I knew it in you the moment I saw you. I recognized it, though my general did not. Give me back my innocence, Mei.” His words were whispers across her skin, punctuated by his the touch of his lips on her cheeks, her eyelids, the tip of her nose, her chin, and finally, again, her lips.

“Yes, Katsu!”

She wanted to know what he meant. She wanted to understand everything about him, especially his motives, and particularly if his intentions were what he’d said. Was she brought to the palace just for a sham engagement to get the other nations off his back? Was she in particular brought because she was just plausible enough, and had the benefit of pissing off people who annoyed him?

And yet now was not the time for such words, for she could not bring herself to ask the questions. Now, here, her curiosity did not have complete control of her actions.

She writhed against him. “Please, Katsu,” she begged, “make me yours, please.”

“Forever,” he promised, his lips brushing against hers with the word. And then he kissed her deeply.

Mei’s body exploded into light and she moaned as she woke, aching and confused, remembering only the firmness of Katsu’s body against hers, the feel of his lips, and the single word, _Forever._

She laughed at herself for indulging in such ridiculous dreams before rolling over and going back to sleep.

* * *

“Have dinner with me,” was the hauntingly deep and shadowy voice from behind her. But she couldn’t move. They were alone, in the bath, and the deliciously hot water lapped at her abdomen as she stood.

He stood behind her, holding onto her hips, bending low and moving her hair out of the way. When he kissed her shoulder, she could feel the scrape of the mask.

“Why am I really here?” she asked, arching her body more firmly into his, feeling his hands, his lips, the length of his body, and the hot, hot water.

“Because I want you here,” he responded simply.

The steam rose from the water and the smallest of sounds echoed in the room. Her gasp. His groan.

His arms circled around her waist and she felt the scars, those familiar scars that Yuuta bore, that she couldn’t stop looking at the other time she'd seen them.

She reached around with her right hand, holding the back of his head as he continued to kiss and lick her shoulder, her neck, and Mei ran her fingers through his hair.

She sighed in ecstasy and turned toward his face.

Her heart jolted.

_His hair was black._

It was the decoy who had been taking liberties.

Her shock was palpable and her anger keen.

She slapped his face, her finger catching on the mask. Skin sliced and blood dripped into the water. She put pressure on her finger and when she looked back at the decoy, it wasn’t the decoy any longer. It was Yuuta behind the mask of Katsu, with his silver white hair.

He reached for her wounded hand and she slowly gave it up to him. He kissed her bloody finger and then placed it in his mouth. He laved it with his tongue before sucking on it strongly.

Mei’s body was throbbing with desire, her cheeks flushed with wanting as the Blood King stood naked in the bath with her, drinking down her blood like wine. She wrapped herself around him and felt the strength in the arm that came around, hoisting her off her feet until the only comfortable thing to do was wrap her legs around his waist in the water.

But the dream floated away as Mei began to awake just before the dawn of a new day.

After a moment, she muttered to herself. “This is completely insane.” She shifted, uncomfortably full of wanting for an act she had never actually accomplished with a man before.

“This is completely insane,” she reiterated, trying to convince herself even as her left hand trailed down her body and wiggled underneath her night clothes.

Mei bit her lip as she tried to bring herself some relief. Her fingers were too small. Her hand not strong enough. She was not surrounded in Yuuta’s smell, nor overshadowed by his physical presence.

‘This is completely insane,’ she thought to herself, even as she also thought of what might have been in the bathhouse, if they had been alone, if she had taken all leave of her senses, if she had actually gone ahead and taken advantage of the situation.

She imagined how he might touch her, take her into his arms, hold her and touch her just like she touched herself.

‘Beautiful Mei, I love you,’ he would say.

And the kisses. Oh, to be kissed by Yuuta - she imagined the softness of his lips, and licking them. She imagined the feel of his tongue, the safety of his strong form cradling her. His fingers deep inside of her wet and willing cleft, his lips soft against hers. She could almost feel it, it was so close, so close, _so close!_

Mei grunted softly, her orgasm small and slight and only barely satisfactory. Afterwards she just felt annoyed.

“This is completely insane,” she muttered to no one in particular before getting up and washing herself, beginning her day in precisely the same manner that she had for the last six weeks.

* * *

 


	2. Dinner Plans Askew

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Episode 26, Mei finds that the dinner she'd uncertainly anticipated with Katsu goes according to no one's plans.

* * *

The first thing she noticed was Katsu’s enormous bed.

The second thing she’d noticed was the lack of food, of any sort, and particularly none laid out in any sort of dinner formation.

Certainly there was no seductive dinner full of tidbits that the Blood King might hand feed her, his fingertips brushing her lips, her tongue darting out, her teeth nipping on purpose to tease him.

Not that she wanted that of course. Or had caught her rebellious mind considering just how devastating it would be if Katsu looked into her eyes and perchance smiled, or more likely just smoldered.

Katsu smoldered well.

Not that Mei was prepared to admit it, even under torture. It was just her dreams - that she could not control, thank you very much - that haunted her. And he seemed to be doing more than just smoldering in the dreams. Not that she remembered them in much detail, of course. But the general gist was always pretty obvious.

Katsu, making love to her in the bath.

Katsu, making love to her in the meadow near the temple.

Katsu, making love to her in her quarters - well, her old quarters. She couldn’t see him coming to the barracks for that.

Katsu, making love to her in the forest not far from her old home. On the ground. Up against a tree. On a horse.

Katsu.

Katsu.

Katsu.

Mei cursed herself briefly again. She didn’t even _fully_ know what lovers did when alone. She knew the basic mechanics - she’d seen mares being bred, and she’d talked with other girls, so she knew a man wasn’t as large as a horse (such a relief) and that there were more positions than just that of a stallion and a mare (the imagination boggled), but she was still pure. And the imagination only went so far without explicit directions, which she’d never managed to procure.

_One of many things you should ask Katsu. Or Ryu, if you want the assurance of a positive response._

_‘As if. No, there are many things I want to talk about with Katsu tonight, but ‘how would you make love to me, if I gave you the opportunity?’ is not one of them.’_

_You should definitely open with that._

Attempting to banish her inner critic, Mei stepped into the large room, seemingly devoid of dinner, and heard the door close behind her.

She waited a moment.

And another moment.

_You should just start stripping. Then you wouldn’t have to ask any questions at all._

_‘I’m not listening to you.’_

_Yes you are. And if you don’t want Ryu, then you should tell Katsu that he’s pursuing you inappropriately._

_‘That’s actually not a bad idea,’_ Mei considered, wondering if she’d lacked for intelligent conversation too often that she was starting to agree with the inner critic.

_And then kiss him._

Nevermind.

* * *

 _‘Well, this night turned out so very much worse than I could have possibly imagined,’_ Mei considered once she had Katsu’s permission to take a nap in his enormous bed. Alone. While he studiously ignored her, working, because he was a busy man, and they were not friends, and this was all a sham anyway, and it was a damn good thing he hadn’t so much as looked at her, because she was wearing that stupid, beautiful hair clip he’d bought for her and now she felt like a _complete_ lovesick hormonal _idiot,_ but at least there was a chance she’d get out at the end of the night without him noticing. Even if he looked straight at her, he probably wouldn’t notice, or maybe not even care. So it was probably fine, anyway.

_Liar. He’s upset. You’ve upset him. And now he’s ignoring you, but it’s actually all your own fault._

Mei’s attention was piqued when she heard him get up quietly and move about, but she couldn’t see. She’d already carefully arranged the current set of beautiful and borrowed clothes so that she wouldn’t crease them too badly, despite taking a nap in them. Besides, she laid down to take a nap. Not to think about Katsu.

Infuriating, beautiful man.

Besides, she needed the rest. Mei just had a feeling that Ryu was going to be laying in wait for her to spring a trap on her way back to the barracks, and of course she would be at a huge disadvantage because of the clothing.

_And it’s not Ryu you were hoping to wrestle with in this dress._

_‘Shut up, shut up, shut up,’_ she thought to herself, closing her eyes as she did so.

And then the music began.

Mei almost gasped. It was beautiful. She’d never heard the guqin played so beautifully before.

She blinked back spontaneous tears and smiled, closing her eyes finally to try and sleep.

She didn’t even consider her propensity to dream, and her inner critic didn’t think she needed to be reminded, just now.

* * *

Katsu played the guqin.

Katsu held her in his arms, whispering in her ear.

The contradiction didn’t bother Mei, in the dream.

“So beautiful. Why, why would you only come to me when I order you, not when I ask?”

His lips were at her throat as he asked, and his tone was anguished.

His arms were wrapped around her waist, holding her close.

His fingers on the guqin played a song of pure angst across the room.

Mei gasped at the feelings rushing through her body. Looking up at the ceiling of his private chamber, she responded. “I didn’t want to be just another body in your bed.”

“The only body in my bed has been mine. I told you I don’t have a harem.”

“I wanted to be special.”

“You already are.”

“To you.”

“You already are,” he said again, whispering this time.

The song was so full of pain, and Mei responded in kind.

“I want to train with Ryu, but I don’t want to sleep with him. But he seems rather bent on it, regardless of our engagement. He knows it’s fake, doesn’t he?”

Katsu didn’t respond, he only wrapped his lips around the base of her neck and began to suck.

Mei moaned in longing. She loved his passion for her, his ardor.

Katsu played guqin, pouring his soul out into the instrument.

“I think you should sleep with him,” said the smug voice at her throat that shocked Mei to her core.

She looked at him the best she could - he wasn’t cooperating - but immediately she saw the dark hair.

Katsu was across the room, playing the guqin.

The dark-haired decoy in the mask held her in his arms.

“In fact,” the decoy added with an unwelcome leer, “Why don’t we start right now?”

Mei struggled to get out of his embrace, but it was like being in the brothel all over again. It seemed to last forever, that struggle, and all the while Mei became more and more terrified, felt more and more trapped.

And then the music stopped.

Ryu the Decoy disappeared, and it was just Katsu again, and for the first time, somehow.

She could smell him.

She could feel the pressure of his presence against her skin, as if he were touching her.

“Mei,” he said, with longing in his voice. “Mei, I love you so.”

He kissed her softly, briefly, nothing like the passionate kisses of before.

She sighed in happiness, and also a little confusion. “Mmm, Katsu?” she asked, not knowing the words to use to ask him why he was not taking her swiftly and decisively. Still, it was minor.

“Forgive me,” he whispered. “But I will not send you back to him tonight.”

“Oh, Katsu! I would forgive you anything. Let me stay here with you. _”_

He kissed her and her heart lept. She kissed him back with all of her might, wrapping her arms around him and keeping him close. The intensity of his physical presence was so overwhelming she was shivering.

And then he was at her side, pulling her close, pulling her back to his front. His arms were wrapped around her, his lips at her neck.

Mei arched her neck back, groaning with pleasure, wrapped inside a cocoon of his warm safety.

His hands provided needed pressure in the place she had no words for, and she came apart with his lips on her neck.

“Katsu! **_Katsu!”_ ** she wailed, without thought for who might overhear.

He chuckled, his laughter a low, dark, satisfied sound, and Mei shivered all over again, still gasping.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okey dokey, then. Tell me what you think. I love talking with y'all.

**Author's Note:**

> It should be said that even though my darling husband has yet to catch up with the storyline, and thus hasn't beta'd this story here, I still write for him. (And me.)


End file.
